Go Pennsylvania Dutch at Kutztown Folk Festival

In 1950, television was a novelty, computers were something only scientists tinkered with, and a car ride into the country was considered Sunday afternoon family entertainment.

Little did the local farmers that organized the first Kutztown Folk Festival know at the time, the festival would come to be known as “the oldest folklife festival in America,” now in its 64th year of celebrating Pennsylvania Dutch culture.

As attendance grew — the festival attracts around 150,000 visitors per year, according to kutztownfestival.com — new programs and attractions were added, such as the display and sale of Pennsylvania Dutch quilts. During the week, there are more than 2,000 handmade in America quilts to admire.

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In fact, one of the festival’s biggest attractions is a quilt auction, held on the last Saturday of the festival at noon on the Main Stage, and draws some big bids.

“We actually have the largest new quilt sale in the nation,” said Kutztown Folk Festival executive director Dave Fooks.

Craft exhibitions represent the expertise of artists in various media, and the craft artisans dress in 19th century attire.

Upper Gwynedd resident Steve Hunter will have more than 400 of his stoneware pottery pieces — which are both microwave and dishwasher safe — for sale and he’ll demonstrate his kick wheel potter’s wheel and twice-kiln-fired process.

Hunter makes pitchers, jugs, dishes, coffee mugs — “anything you can make from pottery,” he said.

“You get a nice crowd and people are fascinated to see stuff. This was my major show,” said the retired Wissahickon School District teacher.

“It’s great for kids,” said Hunter, sharing that he used to bring his children to the festival when they were younger. “If kids are inquisitive, there’s always people they can talk to.”

Children’s activities include old-fashioned rides, a hay maze, the Hex Express — a train fashioned from 55-gallon drums and pulled by a tractor, puppet shows, sing-alongs, story telling, a magician, a ventriloquist and others. There are also craft and play areas, pony rides and a 19th century horse-drawn carousel.

“We have an unofficial motto: ‘Helping families have fun’,” said Fooks.

Fooks said that an unfortunate reality of a large, multiple-day festival is lost children. With a laugh, he said that most of them are found at the Children’s Petting Zoo, where kids and adults, can feed and pet the farm animals.

More than 80 entertainment acts can be found on six stages, but it’s not just music. The entertainment schedule includes clog and hoedown dancing, presentations on Mennonite life, Pennsylvania Dutch dialect humor, a presentation on the Pennsylvania Germans that fought at the Battle of Gettysburg and more.

“I find it all fascinating. You always see someone using a 100-year-old piece of farm equipment to chop up rocks or dig a hole for a fence post,” said Hunter of the displays of antique farming equipment.

Pennsylvania Dutch food is famous for being tasty and filling, but not necessarily for being the most healthy thing you can eat. That’s why Fooks recommended visiting the Schutt family’s Pennsylvania Dutch buffet at the “Windsor Castle Church” buffet building. The buffet offers both the homemade version of the traditional dishes, alongside more health-conscious versions of the same dish.

There’s even beer available for sale, and sample traditional favorites like birch beer, root beer and sarsaparilla, which is distilled on location.

Keeping close to its roots, the festival still does sheep shearing, a community quilt on which everyone can sew a patch, and a Fourth of July parade.

The Kutztown Folk Festival was always held around the Fourth of July, Fooks said, because “traditionally, that’s when everybody closed down to take a vacation.”

The festival is so steeped in tradition, Fooks said, that usually the only time they get complaints is when they change something. A landmark of the Kutztown Folk Festival for years, the giant green chair on the festival grounds was taken down, and became a hot topic of conversation when it returned, Fooks said.

Other highlights include reenactments of legends and historical drama, a 19th century summer kitchen, and the chance to see how good your Pennsylvania Dutch is in the exhibit area of the Grundsau Lodges. Groundhog lodges, as they’re known in English, are annual gatherings to speak in the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect and revel in Pennsylvania German folklife.

According to Fooks, “a number” of officers from Allentown’s Grundsau Loge Nummer Ains “are involved with the festival.”

IF YOU GO

WHAT: 64th annual Kutztown Folk Festival.

WHEN: 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily June 29-July 7, rain or shine.

WHERE: Kutztown Fairgrounds, 225 N. Whiteoak St., Kutztown.

ADMISSION: $14, $13 for seniors, $5 for students 13-17, free to children 12 and under. A $3 off coupon is available on the festival website.